This week is a whirlwind of conferences. I will be presenting on a panel about Penn State’s response to the Sandusky scandal at MICA (Wednesday) and at NAEA‘s National Conference (Friday)! Here’s one of the slides I made for my presentation on the Blue Out. (If you’re confused, check out the knowyourmeme page.)
One of my classes this semester (Design Studio) focuses on learning particular technologies. I recently finished the Arduino section and wanted to share it!
Arduino is a small computer (an open-source single-board microcontroller) that works with flexible, easy-to-use, and inexpensive hardware and software. It is intended to be used by artists, designers, and hobbyists to create interactive objects or environments.
After completing introductory exercises that controlled LED lights, I became interested in using the Arduino to regulate sounds. I found a few tutorials online that used different accessories to make noise through the microcontroller, particularly one that used a potentiometer to regulate pitch. While I really liked this idea, I thought the design and code I found online was far too complicated for such a simple task. Using other project tutorials (controlling the speed of a LED light, coding a song through a speaker), I pared down the original coding to match a simpler layout. The final result included a small Piezo speaker attached directly to the Arduino board and a potentiometer connected to the computer through a breadboard.
My Code
/*
Simple Tone Adjustment with Potentiometer
*/
// set pin numbers:
const int speakerPin = 11; // the number of the Piezo speaker
const int sensorPin = 2; // the number of the potentiometer
// variables will change:
int sensorValue = 0; // the value read from the pot
int noteValue = 0; // gets converted to a “note”
void setup() {
pinMode(speakerPin, OUTPUT); // set the speaker’s pin for output
}
void loop(){
sensorValue = analogRead(sensorPin); // get the pot’s value
noteValue = ((((1024 – sensorValue) / 1024.0) * 959) + 956); // convert
digitalWrite(speakerPin, HIGH);
delayMicroseconds(noteValue);
digitalWrite(speakerPin, LOW);
delayMicroseconds(noteValue);
}
The Penn State Graduate Research Poster Exhibition is coming up, and I’ve just finished (and submitted) my abstract! I would love any feedback or pointers.
Highlights of the origins, interpretations, and influences of the Penn State Blue Out are analyzed by the graduate student co-founder and organizer to provide unequivocal access to a moment of effective grassroots activism. The Blue Out was the first and largest public response to the 2011 Sandusky molestation scandal at the Pennsylvania State University. Earlier in the year, fans were asked to wear white to the November 12 football game. This tradition, called a “White Out,” was intended to intimidate the opposing team. Students and community members began to support a “Blue Out” after Laura March discovered that blue was the nationally recognized color of child abuse prevention and proposed a change. The event provided a platform to distribute educational materials on child abuse, to collect funds for related charities, and to showcase creative expressions of solidarity with abuse victims and survivors. Only six days passed between the event’s inception and fruition.
Background information regarding the sexual abuse allegations is detailed and the researcher’s personal connection with the football program, school, and community is clarified. A vacuum of university communication immediately following the breaking news is questioned, particularly as it further sustained a culture of silence. Out of this officially mandated silence, the Blue Out emerged as a proactive response to the scandal. The campaign’s goals are then considered and evaluated.
As a community-wide event, the Blue Out demonstrated how positive social action can be fostered at the intersection of art education and instructional systems. Researching the visual culture and multimodal discourse that surrounded the event reveals how meaning is generated and disseminated within the context of digital communication. Visual culture theory enables the interpretation of the visual images, objects, events, and other cultural productions that were appropriated and reimagined by the Penn State community as a result of the Blue Out. Multimodal discourse analysis assesses the meanings generated through different media that promoted or criticized the event, such as digital photograph manipulation, blog posts, and social media commentary. Further examination of the social media response to the allegations questions the methods used by official outlets and the impact of censorship on public dialog. Other events influenced by the Blue Out are then examined, including a fundraising walk and the launch of a national children’s protection center at the university.
I created a collage for an assignment that described community through the lens of Wenger (1998) for my Disruptive Technologies class. It took such a long time, but it was very well received by my classmates. You can check out their comments on the class blog.
